D&D (2024) The Problem with Healing Powercreep

[Micah Sweet]

Neither seems significantly different me - not to each other, and not to the way the game plays.

You could make a case that third edition was a bit of a departure, but 2nd edition was already getting excessively crunchy by that point so it felt like a continuation in the same direction.

Are you perhaps a fan of what WotC has done with 5.5 and the changes they made? I've noticed that the more someone is in favor of the new thing, and the more it aligns with the way they already want to or have played the game, the less significant they see any changes that are there, especially if they are design philosophy stuff that already matches with what they like.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Are you perhaps a fan of what WotC has done with 5.5 and the changes they made? I've noticed that the more someone is in favor of the new thing, and the more it aligns with the way they already want to or have played the game, the less significant they see any changes that are there, especially if they are design philosophy stuff that already matches with what they like.

Well, I’ve been playing the same way since 1st edition (and Basic), and the only versions of D&D that have struggled to support my playstyle are 3rd (a bit) and 4th (not at all). So whatever 5.5 is doing, it’s what D&D has always done.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well, I’ve been playing the same way since 1st edition (and Basic), and the only versions of D&D that have struggled to support my playstyle are 3rd (a bit) and 4th (not at all). So whatever 5.5 is doing, it’s what D&D has always done.

I respect your opinion.

 

[tetrasodium]

IME this entirely depends on the number of clerics in relation to the number of PCs and their level. And of course it's not just rolling the dice, it's counting up the results and allocating the healing, checking the resulting status, resting and casting some more. I don't want to overstate it--it's not some intolerable element of the classic rules--it's just an annoyance that adds nothing to the game IMO. There should always be good incentives/motivation to "stay in the field."

I remember playing 3.x & adnd2e plus some vague memories of whatever not quite adnd2e came in a box set in the 2e days and your descriptions over the last few exchanges on this tangent don't at all line up with my memories. Weirdly @Lanefan 's line up with those memories to a T. It wasn't till 5e that this stuff because a slog at the table thanks to various design choices that hung the task of designing a whole homebrew subsystem and resulting table of directionless players on the gm and teach players the Homebrew subsystem they are likely to be left handling completely while a player sits and stares at the meat computer they expect to handle it.

 

[Greg Benage]

I remember playing 3.x & adnd2e plus some vague memories of whatever not quite adnd2e came in a box set in the 2e days and your descriptions over the last few exchanges on this tangent don't at all line up with my memories.

I started in 1980 so most of my experience with classic D&D was with AD&D. In large, higher level (i.e. above 5th) parties with few clerics, it routinely took multiple "rest days" for the cleric(s) to memorize and cast enough healing spells to restore the party's hit points. This was routine. I guess you could do a reality check by looking at the pool of hit points for a large party and comparing that to 1e cure spells and slots. I'd also note that @Lanefan liked my post pointing this out--it's just that he sees it as a feature, not a bug.

ETA: Here's a start. A 7th-level cleric in 1e can cast 4 cure light wounds and 1 cure serious wounds. As I recall, it takes 15 minutes per spell level to memorize spells (in addition to sleepytime). So assuming the party is tapped when they rest, they first have to sleep. Then the cleric prays for a couple hours (if only memorizing the cure spells), at which point they can do 6d8+1 healing for the day, or 28 hit points on average. Then you can repeat this process, and again, and again, until the party is healed up. Then, you'll want to rest again so the cleric can memorize all their spells, not just the cure spells. Then you're ready to play the game again. (Any unfortunate random encounters during this time will, of course, delay the process, as rest is interrupted, more damage is incurred, and spells are consumed.)

It's possible 2e resolved this problem/feature (depending on your perspective)--I don't really know. I also know it wasn't an issue with 3.x, because PCs were always festooned with cure wands.

And...I really don't care. I don't like devoting days of game-time and significant play-time to rest and healing mechanics. If this has never been a problem for you, or if you do like the effect of these mechanics on your game (e.g. @Lanefan), then you shouldn't care either. I'm not trying to convince you of anything--merely explaining why "fast healing" in games such as 5e or Shadowdark work just fine for me. As always, you do you!

 

[CreamCloud0]

This will not get rid of whackamole healing regardless. That would require there being some actually impactful downside for going to zero, so healers would need to focus on keeping people up.

i would make it harder to revive people, if it's a chore to revive them then you'd be incentivised to not let them go down in the first place, make it so you can't get people up just from giving them a positive hitpoint total, i'd implement a 1st or cantrip level spell something like:

REVITALISE
Cantrip - Necromancy.
Range - 15ft.
Components - V, S, M (a pinch of diamond dust).
Duration - 1 round.
You target one creature that is within range when you begin casting that is either dying or stable but unconcious and begin to rouse them to conciousness, at the start of your next turn if the casting has not been disrupted the target awakens and gains 1 HP if they don't already have any, if you or the target take any damage while this spell is being cast you must make a concentration saving throw to prevent the casting being disrupted. (this spell doesn't use the concentration slot despite concentration checks needing to be made)

i would combine this with mild diminishing returns for healing overly injured targets:
HP 100%-50% full healing dice + casting mod.
HP 50%-25% remove 1 healing die + casting mod.
HP 25%-<0% remove 1 healing die.

all of this means that you don't want your characters to be getting down into the red or even getting close to it.

 

[Staffan]

When you design a game you need to determine how you want healing to work.

Do you want healing to be a thing people do in combat? In that case, it needs to be strong enough that spending your action on it is a good use of that action, alternately that it doesn't use up an action. If you also have large reserves of potential healing (e.g. lots of spell slots), this can lead to fights turning into a slog, so you might want to limit how much healing can be brought to bear in any one battle. You probably also want damage to be high compared to the amount of hit points people have to make the healing relevant.

Do you want healing to be a thing primarily done between fights to make sure you're ready for the next one? In that case, healing doesn't need to be strong, but it needs to be abundant.

Do you want healing to be a thing primarily done between fights but also something you need to carefully ration? Again, it probably shouldn't be very strong and should also be scarce.

Do you want healing to be a common thing or something exclusively the domain of particular characters? That determines whether it should be a spell that's only on particular spell lists or if it's a core ability of characters.

Some of these options can be combined. For example, 4e allowed characters to self-heal once per combat as a (weakish) action, but leader-types could allow them to heal additional times but only twice per combat (thrice at high levels). In addition, people could heal up between fights, with a ceiling on how much they could heal in total that was fairly high but not unlimited.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

You were doing so very well up to here...

...but here you unfortunately go off the rails.

The answer is to not even try to make healing useful in combat; instead it's to do whatever's necessary to take in-combat healing almost entirely off the table other than high-risk fliers to save dying party members. Healing is what you do between combats, not during them.

Or in other words, if you're healing in combat it means your party has made some big mistakes somewhere. In combat your Clerics should be contributing in other, more offense-minded ways.

One thing your otherwise-good analysis didn't account for was natural hit point recovery: 1 point per in-game day in 1e went to get-'em-all-back-overnight in 4e and 5e. So, not only has healing power increased dramatically over the editions, the need for it has also decreased.

I think that isn't as good as answer as you might think. If you can't heal in combat, at least with an ablative hit point system, is that you know that you still can take X hits before you're in real danger. So there isn't a lack of tension until the very end, where suddenly you might be dead after the next hit. But before that, you were doing all the same things, and there isn't really that much variety and as much tension. Especially if you're playing a class that otherwise has none or very little other limited resources they can spend (like most spellcasters).

Kinda like those boring type of superhero fights were indestructable superhero is fighting invulnerable supervillain until at some point the script writers said we've seen enough SFX and one guy gets the knockout shot.
In-combat meaning heals you have tight situations mid-combat, where you have to decide between your usual offensive options or doing something to restore someone's hit points so they can stay active longer. You might need to reposition, not use your favorite attacks, delay your action for a better opportunity. The tension rises and falls several times during battle, rather than only sharply at the end.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think that isn't as good as answer as you might think. If you can't heal in combat, at least with an ablative hit point system, is that you know that you still can take X hits before you're in real danger. So there isn't a lack of tension until the very end, where suddenly you might be dead after the next hit. But before that, you were doing all the same things, and there isn't really that much variety and as much tension. Especially if you're playing a class that otherwise has none or very little other limited resources they can spend (like most spellcasters).

Kinda like those boring type of superhero fights were indestructable superhero is fighting invulnerable supervillain until at some point the script writers said we've seen enough SFX and one guy gets the knockout shot.
In-combat meaning heals you have tight situations mid-combat, where you have to decide between your usual offensive options or doing something to restore someone's hit points so they can stay active longer. You might need to reposition, not use your favorite attacks, delay your action for a better opportunity. The tension rises and falls several times during battle, rather than only sharply at the end.

There's nothing tense about whack-a-mole, at least to me. I'd rather just drop folks out of the fight when they hit zero and see how bad they got it (and what can be done) once someone checks on them.

 

[DarkCrisis]

If you have someone sitting out for to long because their character is KOed in combat, it probably means your combat is going on to long.

Been playing OSE / BX and those fights are quick (and deadly).

Modern D&D loves it's HP bloat all around. Why they went that direction I'll never know.